Chapter VII
THE WORK OF THE COMMISSIONERS
THE COMMISSIONERS
HERE was a struggle among the mem-
bers of the board of trustees over the
nomination of the three commissioners
provided for in the law of June 20, 1874. Doug-
lass, whose efforts had secured the legislation
that resulted in the closing of the bank, insisted
that the commissioners should have no connec-
tion with the trustees. Those who ruined the
bank, he said, ought to have nothing to do with
winding up its affairs. But by the act referred
to, the trustees were authorized to nominate the
commissioners, and forthwith three relatives of
trustees were named—just what Douglass had
feared.! However, the Secretary of the Treasury
refused to appoint them, and these new nomina-
tions were then made: John A. J. Creswell,
formerly Postmaster General; R. H. T. Leipold,
a Treasury accountant, said to be related to
John Sherman; and Robert Purvis? a Philadel-
1 Bruce Report, p. 239.
2 Robert Purvis, born 1810, Charleston, S. C., was the son of a white
father and a “Moorish” mother. Going North he attained some promi-
nence as an anti-slavery worker. His son Charles B. Purvis, a physician,
was later surgeon-in-chief of the Freedmen’s Hospital in the District of
Columbia fi Professor in the Medical Department of Howard Uni-
versity. In describing conditions in South Carolina during Reconstruc-
tion J. M. Morgan in Recollections of a Rebel Reefer, p. 329, makes this
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